


Love Like Fools

by liamthebastard



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-07
Updated: 2014-09-07
Packaged: 2018-02-16 11:20:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2267829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liamthebastard/pseuds/liamthebastard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek Hale is in awe of Stiles Stilinski, and has zero qualms about the massive crush he harbors for his brother’s bestie. Not that he'll ever say anything, of course. Because Stiles... Stiles is a supernova, and Derek is barely a star.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Like Fools

Stiles Stilinski is a force of nature, and Derek is in awe of him. It isn’t fair for a freaking sophomore to be so good at the whole high school thing. To be fair, freshman year Stiles had only been good at the academics and socializing, the latter mostly because Lydia had decided she needed someone to both hold her shopping bags and listen to her ramble about theoretical mathematics. Over the summer though, Stiles and Scott had convinced Derek to help them train so they’d actually get to play lacrosse this year, and Derek had caved, helping his brother and his brother’s best friend work out -which was a fresh level of hell he hadn’t anticipated. A sweating, exhausted Stiles was not a mental image he needed, although it is nice to have- until they were both holding places on the team. Scott’s even in line to make team captain within the next year or so.

But that isn’t the point. The point is, Stiles is always busy. He’s friends with nearly everyone in the school, everybody knows him or of him, which is unusual for an underclassmen. Hell, Derek’s a senior and next to nobody knows him. Which could be because he always hovers on the edge of his group of friends. He and Erica are tight, but she and Lydia like to plot evil together, so it’s usually just Derek, watching as Stiles wreaks havoc and mayhem in a timely manner on the rest of the school. He and Lydia co-president the alchemist’s club, he’s an office runner because somehow all the secretaries trust him to get the notes back and forth from classes and teachers without fudging them -which he’s only done twice that Derek knows of-, he plays for the lacrosse team, works tech for the musical, and never walks in the halls because he’s always late for something, and everyone knows to keep out of his way. 

So really, it would be pointless for Derek to try anything with Stiles. Besides, Stiles tends to put him off by loudly and openly pining after Lydia. It’s becoming a bit of a running gag now, Derek is pretty sure Stiles only likes her because he knows she’ll shut him down and he’ll have an excuse to stay single and continue causing trouble. Derek’s only a little jealous, and more of the time Stiles spends with Lydia than the affection he has for her. He’ll just give it time, sooner or later this crush will go away, that’s what crushes do. 

o0o

That evening, Derek’s chilling in the living room with a book when his dad and Melissa come through and ask if he’ll mind making sure Scott didn’t burn the house down when his friend comes over while they go out for date night. Derek doesn’t care either way, he knows it isn’t Stiles because the Sheriff is off tonight so Stiles is making “a real healthy dinner this time, no take-out!”. 

About twenty minutes after his dad and Melissa leave, Scott rockets through the door with his lacrosse gear and Danny in tow. 

“What up big bro,” Scott chirps, tossing his gear in the front closet and putting Danny’s gear alongside it. 

“Not much,” Derek replies, flipping to the next page of his book. Danny waves a little and Derek nods to him while his brother sets up the XBox. A few minute later, Scott and Danny are entrenched in a game of C.o.D. and having a traditional bro talk over it. 

“So what are you gonna do about Stiles?” Scott asks. 

Derek looks up in horror, thinking Scott has somehow discovered his crush, but his stomach sinks the moment he realizes Scott is actually talking to Danny.

Danny shrugs. “I’m not really sure. It’s gotta be something amazing. You’re his best friend, help me out,” he says. 

So Derek has to sit and listen to Scott teach Danny how to win Stiles over. He has to listen to Scott put into words everything Derek already knew about him; his weird fascination with foreign candies, the massive collection of cheap quarter machine toys he kept and added to regularly, the way his coffee order changed depending on how he slept the night before -hazelnut with lots of sugar if he actually slept the night before, black if he went to bed after midnight but before three, and a triple espresso if he didn’t sleep-, and that his Jeep did in fact have a name, but that the name changed multiple times a day according to Stiles’s mood. All the tiny factoids Derek has learned over the years, outlined calmly by a gaming Scott. 

Derek feels sick. He calls it a night early, and goes upstairs to shower and sleep. He manages half of that, and winds up staring up at the ceiling the whole night. He just can’t sleep. All he can see is Stiles with Danny. Holding hands with him. Talking to him. Kissing him. And that’s the worst. Picturing Stiles kissing anybody but Derek hurt like hell. The image haunts him the entire night, and he doesn’t sleep a wink.

The next morning, he and Scott drive to school, but Derek’s so tired he’s not really sure how they manage to get to the school in one piece. 

“Did you stay up late watching Buffy again?” Scott teases. Derek blinks blearily at him until Scott gestures under his eyes to where Derek doubtlessly has huge black bags hanging. Derek grunts. That’s only happened like one time, so Scott can shut up or he can walk to school. Derek tries to say as much, but he’s just too tired to get his tongue to work right. 

They walk through the halls together to the library where Lydia, Stiles, Erica, and Boyd sit in the mornings waiting for Isaac to get out of swim practice. Normally, it’s a loud group that the librarians struggle to keep under control and eventually give up on halfway through the morning, but today it’s near silent. Derek immediately pinpoints the problem.

Stiles isn’t talking. He’s got a fake smile plastered on his face, but his mouth isn’t moving in the stream-of-consciousness everyone’s become accustomed to. Scott tries a couple jokes, Erica flirts at him, Lydia snarks at him, but none of it does anything. Derek even chimes in with a few embarrassing anecdotes about Scott that Melissa had shared with them, including the time Scott decided that he needed a puppy immediately and so adopted the first fuzzy four-legged creature he found, which happened to be a racoon. It gets raucous laughter from everyone else at the table, a loud protest and accompanying pout from Scott, and absolutely nothing from Stiles. 

Derek opens his mouth to ask Stiles what’s wrong, but at that moment the bell rings, and Stiles goes sprinting off, albeit less enthusiastically than usual. 

Later on, Scott texts him to tell him Stiles went straight to the parking lot instead of waiting for Scott to go to practice. Derek makes an executive decision, and texts the captain to say he needed Stilinski for a class project and was borrowing him for the day. He and the captain, Mitch, were on decent terms, so it wasn’t surprising when Mitch replies that it’s cool. Derek books it to the parking lot and leaps into the Camaro and searches the crowded lot for Stiles’s Jeep. He spots it quickly, and through some tricky driving, manages to pull up behind it. Stiles is even _driving_ weird. He’s just winding around the town, not seeming to head anywhere in particular, when suddenly he changes direction and begins to drive with purpose. Derek follows carefully, then matches him turn for turn when he realizes where Stiles is going. Though why Stiles is going to the currently-empty Hale-McCall house, Derek doesn’t know. 

Instead of pulling immediately onto the drive, Derek stalls a little on the access road, giving Stiles time to park and walk away so he won’t feel like he needs to talk to Derek. Derek isn’t stupid enough to think the Sheriff’s kid didn’t notice he was being followed, he just didn’t want to pressure Stiles. Something was clearly up with him, though, and Derek had to make sure he was okay. Derek parks just in time to see Stiles taking the trail that leads towards the Preserve. 

He follows at a distance, always keeping Stiles just within sight on the trail. But at the last minute, Stiles darts around a turn and when Derek rounds it he’s momentarily lost. He freezes, glancing around, and picks up on a rustle that he hopes is Stiles, and pursues it. When he finally finds Stiles’s, the boy has his back pressed up against a massive oak tree and his arms wrapped around his legs holding them to his chest with that big flannel shirt of his tugged tight like he can’t get warm. 

Derek doesn’t have any words for whatever has Stiles so upset, so he just sits down alongside him and looks to where Stiles has his left hand tracing something on the trunk. 

The letters _JS+CS_ wrapped in a heart are carved into the trunk, and beneath them but still in the heart is a small pair of letters, SS. And it hits Derek exactly what day it is. It isn’t Claudia’s birthday, or the anniversary of her death, because he and Scott both have them written down on every calendar they own and programmed into their phones for the rest of eternity. But, he realizes, looking at the way Stiles keeps tracing the heart, it could definitely be his parents’ anniversary. It wasn’t always a bad day for Stiles, the anniversary, that’s why Derek hadn’t immediately thought of it. Usually it’s okay, but clearly today it isn’t. 

And Derek may not be the best example of how to handle grief, but he _can_ provide Stiles with the one thing Stiles enjoys; conversation. So he talks about his own mom. How she never let him get away with anything, how she was always trying to get him and his older sister Laura to get along. How it never really worked but now Laura at least tried a little bit. He talks on and on, not really saying much but sharing the feeling of loss between them, hoping that Stiles will know that Derek understands. And when he finishes talking about his mother, he turns a bit to look at Stiles’s face, and Stiles, god, Stiles is _crying_. Actual tears. 

Stiles shouldn’t be sad, he had a face meant for grinning or laughing, not tears. Without thinking about it, Derek reaches over and tugs Stiles into a hug. Stiles doesn’t fight the embrace, but he doesn’t relax into it either. Instead he just takes it, keeps up the silent tears for a few minutes, and then pulls away when the tears finally stop. Part of Derek aches to lean in and kiss the last of the tears from Stiles’s cheeks, but he resists. Stiles doesn’t need that from him right now, no matter how much Derek wants to give it. 

Instead Derek smiles, and helps Stiles up. They walk back to the house. 

“Don’t worry about practice,” Derek says as they part ways at the Jeep. “I told Mitch I was stealing you for a project.”

“Thanks, man,” Stiles mutters, his voice still thick from crying. “You’re a good friend.” 

Derek doesn’t reply, just nods at Stiles and heads into the house alone.

o0o

Over the next few days, Stiles talks and jokes and laughs with everyone as if things are normal. But in the quiet moments between jokes and the natural lulls in conversation, Stiles’s face turns contemplative. Derek catches Stiles looking at him searchingly now and then in the times they hang out the following week. They spend more time together now; when Derek isn’t at Stiles’s house after practice, Stiles is at Derek’s, goofing off with the XBox while Scott is out wooing Allison. One night, maybe ten days after the day at the Preserve, Derek walks Stiles to the door and watches as he walks to the Jeep and pulls out of the drive. 

Scott makes a scoffing sound behind him, startling Derek. “Dude. You are _so_ gone on him,” Scott sighs. 

“Am not,” Derek muttered, more out of habit than any actual desire to keep it secret. 

“Completely gone. And bro, if you want to have a chance with him, you’ve got to move fast. Danny’s gonna make his move soon, and as much as I like the dude, I like you a lot better,” Scott advises. “That’s not to say I won’t totally kill either of you if the other gets hurt, that’s just manners.” Derek rolls his eyes at his brother’s theatrics. “But he’s gone on you too, has been for ages. And it’ll be good for you both to get that pining out of your systems.” And Scott leaves the room.

Never let it be said that Derek’s brother isn’t dramatic. 

o0o

But he’s got a point, so Derek decides that after school the next day, he’ll invite Stiles out for dinner. If he says no to it as a date, Derek can always chicken out and say he meant as just friends. If he says yes… well Derek will deal with that if it happens. 

If Derek takes a bit more time choosing what he’s wearing for school that morning, it’s nobody’s business but his own, and certainly not Scott’s, no matter what the kid seems to think. He walks calmly through the halls to Stiles’s locker, meaning to catch him now and ask him to wait outside his last period for Derek, but when he turns down that hall, he sees Danny leaning against Stiles’s locker, and Stiles heading right for him, and Derek panics. He sprints forward, calling Stiles’s name a little ridiculously, and Stiles stops dead in the hallway, turning to look at Derek. 

“Do- do you wanna go to dinner tonight? With me?” Derek blurts out, not even trying ot make it sound casual like he’d planned the night before. 

At first Stiles just seems startled, but after a minute his face softens and he smiles, small and secret, and nods. Derek grins, but remembers at the last second Danny’s existence, and looks over Stiles’s shoulder to try and express his sympathy. Danny just catches his eye and smiles, a little sad but by no means devastated, before leaving.

Derek can’t help but feel a little victorious.

o0o

That night, Derek agrees to go to the shitty little diner on main street that Stiles loves but never goes to because he’s trying to keep the Sheriff healthy. 

“This way, if he hears about it, which he will because he _always does_ , I can say it was your idea,” Stiles explains proudly as they walk over from Stiles’s house. Derek had opted to have Scott drop him off, so he and Stiles could spend more time together taking the short walk between the diner and the Sheriff’s house. 

They chat comfortably through the meal of double cheeseburgers, piles of fries, and overly-large milkshakes. As Stiles laughs and smiles at Derek, Derek is reminded vividly of just how brightly Stiles burns. He finds himself chuckling or smiling at everything Stiles says, completely enchanted by the boy sitting across from him. Almost certainly everyone else in the diner will be reporting back to Stiles’ father and the Hale-McCalls on their every move, but Derek can’t bring himself to care. 

In fact, when the bill comes, Derek makes a point of insisting on paying it. 

“Better be careful with that wallet, Hale, people might think we’re dating,” Stiles says as the waitress leaves, clearly meaning it as a joke.

That brings Derek up short. He was under the impression that this was a date, had intended to lead this into a relationship, and had thought Stiles was in favor of that. Had he read the whole thing wrong?

Stiles must notice his panic, because a second later he speaks. “Wait. Do you _want_ to be dating?” Derek’s words seem to have failed him, because all he can do it nod. “But- What if we ruin it all? Everything we’ve got going, I mean.”

Derek shrugs a bit. “What if we don’t?” The waitress brings back his credit card just then, and he gestures for Stiles to lead the way out of the diner. 

Once they’re safely out of the diner and on the sidewalk, Stiles starts chattering. “But what if something goes wrong, like we have a fight over who calls who more or something and then we break up and never speak to each other again? Or what if one of us get super jealous over something and then decides the other’s not worth the trouble? What if one of us decides we don’t want the other anymore?” He keeps listing possibilities, but Derek can hear it for what it really is: fear. They’re at Stiles’s door by the time Stiles pauses for a breath. “I mean, it’s just a crush so it’s probably gonna be gone soon,” Stiles sighs. 

Derek levels a serious stare at Stiles. “I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anyone, Stiles,” he says, feeling anxiety begin to flutter in his stomach. Stiles’s eyes go wide, his face open and readable, and abruptly Derek can see it, that want that he feels in him reflected back at him perfectly, and it frightens him a little in its intensity. 

Somehow their lips are almost touching, but neither of them move to get closer or to pull back. They just hover in limbo, almost kissing but not quite, and Derek can feel his hands shaking with how scared he is, scared of things he thought he was okay with, like the potential this thing had to destroy their entire friendship. 

“God, this is terrifying,” Derek finally huffs.

Stiles grins and chuckles. “I know,” he agrees, and that’s it, Derek can’t wait anymore. If they’re both scared, it’s okay to take the risk, because at least they’re taking it together. 

So he closes the distance between them, kissing Stiles sweetly, and catching his breath when Stiles kisses him back.

Definitely worth the risk, Derek decides.

**Author's Note:**

> Listen to Wonder by Lauren Aquilina for the first half of this fic, then put on Fools by Lauren Aquilina to feel where I was during this piece.


End file.
